Cassetter Rides The Synthwave With Style

     There is a lot of music in the world today and that is an excellent thing, but I will tell you the truth, the rarities are few and far between.  The things I actually play over and over again, and learn, do not come often in the long term scheme of things.  When I am listening to new music it is literally work, and that is the way with everything I suppose.  When I find something I like it takes the drudgery out of the work, its a bonus, it makes my efforts fun and rewarding.  Thank you to all who helped in this endeavor.
     Recently I'd been going through more synthwave and cyberpunk selections found on the net.  I swear some of them must be the promoters relatives.  I can tell by listening there is no other way they could have gotten included at this point in their musical careers, except by being related to the person making the sampler selection.  
     Perhaps they were owed a favor or something, who knows?  Maybe they are baby AIs, still learning.
     One thing is sure, they need to practice a lot more.  If they stick with it they will someday sound wonderful and not make my ears ache, but NOT YET.  My revenge for these ear aches is my understanding that if the people do stick with their music, become adept, they will one day listen back, hearing themselves as I hear them now, and they will feel embarrassment.  
     Believe me, I know all about this.  Writing is much the same.  Some of the things I wrote when I was young make me want to go crawl under a rock.  But those steps were necessary, so I just blush and try to forget the things that rang with inexperience and cliche.  
     Now back to our story.  Recently I was outside doing some work in the greenhouse, and one of the new hour long MP3s came on the player.  I kept busy but was kind of blown away with what I was hearing.  It was really just awesome music to listen to while I was doing what I was doing.  It was so distinctive that I could tell when it was over, when another selection came on the player.  I did something irregular,  I went back and played it again, and again...
     It was so listenable that I played it for a long time.  Being 62 years old makes "A long time" different from what I used to think of as "A long time".  Now a long time is a very long time.  The variety of the music was like anti-redundance, it took me longer than usual to learn it, and then I went looking for more material by the same artist.  
     And there was more.
     The name of the Magician, I mean Musician, well, maybe both, is Cassetter, and Cassetter is Matt From Warsaw Poland.  He chose the name Cassetter on the spur of the moment, because he used a lot of cassettes in his listening world.          

     Matt has only been making music for a few years.  He utilizes electronic computer equipment for all aspects of production, and he is self taught.  As I came to know the music more and more, several of the selections actually transported me away, and I really like it when that happens.
     One day recently a song by Cassetter came on the player, 500th Floor Terrace.  I was spraying water in the greenhouse again, when all of a sudden I was on Mars, it was near sunset and the sky was amazing.  My spacesuit fitted perfectly and didn't even itch!  I was walking along, there on the red planet, and the dirt was indeed a reddish hue.  Then I came across some stone steps leading up a hillside.  I walked up the steps and at the top was a wall with an alcove and in the alcove was a statue of a cat...
     Wait!  What is this?  Where am I?  Ah, back in the greenhouse south of Akela New Mexico, not Mars...but for a few seconds some truly mind bending stuff had occurred.  

     Yeah, I like it very much.

      Later, a song came on named Giant Drill and I remembered one of the Klingon weapons in a Star Trek film I once saw, that giant drill had destroyed Vulcan, birthplace of Spock.  Really it destroyed Vulcan in only some dimensions, and not the one WE inhabit.  I think.  It is a complex multiverse and Cassetter Music fits right into it like a puzzle piece. 
      Matt is a natural musical talent, and Cassetter is an expression of that.  His music is something that HAD to be born,  necessary celebrations.  Matt is a very lucky guy, but his listeners are most fortunate.    

      I wrote to Cassetter and Matt replied to my questions with an interesting and fluent manner.  
     Here are some comments from the Artist himself:

Hi Matt, how long have you been composing?
I've been making music for less than 3 years, so I ended up calling myself a beginner quite recently.  I learned everything by myself (still learning), reading articles, watching videos and what's most important just by producing - I think I have a good workflow which allowed me to make a lot of music.

What music inspires you?
I had different periods in my life when it comes to music I listen to. I've been mainly listening to electronic music, with Vitalic, The Hacker, Infected Mushroom as one of my favorites. In synthwave I enjoy Perturbator and recent work of Daniel Deluxe. I've also listened to a lot of hip hop music in my life (like Mobb Deep or Dogg Pound), also had some period with rock music quite a long time ago (Fear Factory, Tiamat).  

How do you go about composing your pieces?
As for construction of my music it happens quite automatically - I have a general idea of the song, set the tempo, layer the drums, think about the theme and go with the flow. I don't compose in the traditional way - I don't know too much about music theory, so I do most of the melodies on instinct - a lot of them just play in my head. Sometimes I feel like the process of making a track is like the process of reminding myself how the track I already make in the parallel universe sounded.  

What does the future hold for Cassetter?
My next album Robot Era (rel. in June 10th) will be quite diverse, but than I'd like to make music a bit more vibe-consistent. I have most of another album composed and it will be much darker overall.

How do you feel about the seeming surplus of music out in the world today?
There is a lot of music now and it's quite difficult to make money - but I work quickly, make a lot of music, and it seems it is starting to pay off.  On one hand, the things in music are better now, because for sure 20 years ago it would be much more difficult to make anybody hear your music, you needed to have some buddies, know someone etc. and now there are tons of new music and the process of listening is quite different - I feel like even if you'd make one good album, you mean nothing, you need to go through the slow process of building the audience and do a lot of tracks because many people listen to something just a few times and then go on and listen to other tracks, there is a lot of new.  Also you need to stay very active with social media, which is not the part I enjoy too much. Making music is my hobby but the other part (posting on socials, operational stuff) can be a bit exhausting, as I have a full-time job.  Partly because of that I joined with FIXT, and I am quite happy with how things are going with them.

Do you do live performances outside of your home area?
I haven't traveled much, I had just a few gigs and then the pandemic came, though I had some others scheduled.  I hope it'll come back, I think it's a really nice part of being a musician - meeting new people, seeing new places.

Where is home?  Where is your studio?
I was born in Warsaw so I can say it's my city. "Studio" would be a big word in my case.  I just work on a laptop with production monitors and that's it.   I use software to produce.  As for games there are some games with my music and also some streamers use it (as Dr. Disrespect for example), a lot of this stuff happens by FIXT. Producing is now consuming a lot of my free time.

      What do you do outside of Music?

     I am a boxing fan, and I've been an editor on Polish boxing portal for several years before I started producing.   I played Oblivion during the pandemic and finished it.  

How old are you?

     I am 32 now.

**************************

     Among the collaborators listed with the music of Cassetter are Voicians, King Protea, Time Travel, Casey Desmond, Bunny X, Mari Kattman, Affire, and Megan Mcduffie.   Matt says he has no favorites yet and he is completely happy with all his collaborators.

     After I learned  Cassetter -- Back To The 80s (Prime Thanatos compilation), which has nearly a million views on youtube and over 20 thousand likes, I went to FIXT and acquired The Fugitive.  I listened to Entropy online.  I have heard some selections off the new CD Robot Era, and none fail to please.  The music is fun to listen to any time, even while performing other tasks or working.  It will help order your matrix, and some will even take you away to unknown places.
     What I am hearing is music that had to get out, it is true expression, and there is nothing that can hold it back.  This is music Matt wanted to hear, needed to hear, and it wasn't on this world yet, so he brought it.
     The only thing you can take from here is what is in your head, so LOAD UP, and don't forget to hear this.  I intend to take this music where ever I go.  
     Cassetter rides the Synthesizer Wave with ultimate style, and he is hanging ten.  Way up at the front of the surfboard he lets his toes feel the foam as his back arches and his arms thrust outward in a balancing act not easy to achieve.       
     And its just the first wave of the day.


Fin

Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU8y7EzijNWUAPdAfae0rEg

Buy albums on Bandcamp (Its much easier than anywhere else):
https://cassetter.bandcamp.com/

Soundcloud
https://soundcloud.com/cassetter

Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/artist/6rzOP8pWzUuXlniCGCtrcE

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/CassetterOfficial

Fixtstore.com
https://fixtstore.com/products/cassetter-entropy-instrumentals-digital-album?variant=32643237937230

Back To The 80s compilation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snBcA-AqVGk

500th floor terrace

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1H7bAFnmA4

James Guttman's HIGHSOCIETY

 HIGHSOCIETY

 

Music Review
Bill Gallagher
3550 Words



      I'm going to show you a world within.  A world of rage, and intensity.  Although invisible, its forces are powerful...
                                   On My Level

   The first time I heard James Guttman's HIGHSOCIETY was on a selection compiled by a Youtube music promoter called "Cyberpunk 2077 Mix, NS Dark Techno Electro Music -- Play Hard Go Pro 45".  I was driving through Deming at night.  It was just me and a few cows and wide open moonlit country.  The selection "Louder -- I Can Take Your Pain Away" came up on the USB player, and my adventure began.  

     The sub-genre of Electronic Dance Music (EDM) called "Cyberpunk" seems most notable because of what the musicians call drops and breaks,  sharp transitions between sounds or levels of sounds, and generally much more radical than things like Skrillex or Voicians.  Radical to the point of dissonance.   

     This dissonance in Hardcore Cyberpunk makes it hard to listen to for some people, ie old people like me.  This I'm sure is something of an attraction to younger people, because being different from our elders is a rite of passage.  There is also a lot of flexing of technological muscles by the younger musicians, and who can blame them?  Anybody talking this stuff down is just jealous because they didn't have these capabilities in their time.
 
     Anyway. I'd been listening to a few things called Cyberpunk during my constant quest for New Music, but this, what I was hearing on the song "Louder -- I Can Take Your Pain Away", was not Cyberpunk in the strictest sense.  It was definitely Cyber, as anyone with half an ear could tell, but the punk part, I don't think so.  Here was a well developed musical intricacy, bordering on dissonance, but never going into it.  It was some kind of ideal marriage between hard electronix and melodix, working one into the other.

     I had found the New again!  There is fun in looking, but more fun in finding.  I searched out  the track and the artist by querying the promoters title in Google.  After some further electro-adventuring I found the single on youtube.  Questing even further I discovered a lot about the artist himself, because his output is  impressive in its quantity and quality.  I heard more music by HIGHSOCIETY, and I even saw the man himself doing instruction videos, and performing live in front of huge boards of electronic equipment, equipment I didn't understand, but I liked it anyway.

     It is a New Truth that equipment is a big factor in music today, bigger than it has ever been before.  This equipment progresses at a fantastic pace, as fast as code can be written.  The computer is as much of music now as simple electricity was among the first electrified musical instruments.  It is a whole new world.   Consider the literal electro-video barrage that young people today accept as normal, and you can see that they are on another level of perception by default.  I think the Transformer movies were much more influential in modern music than most people know, even more than the theme music from the Haunted Mansions at the Disney Worlds, and that is a lot.

     In line with the above postulation is the fact that equipment to hear music correctly is almost as complex, in its own way, as the equipment to produce the music.  Some of the boom boxes driving around out here in the NM desert have never been wet in their lives, because even if it does rain they shake any water right off with a field of sound whose vibrations can be felt from far far away.  Not kidding. Those cars must be equipped with special glass, otherwise it would just shatter from the beats.  Everything scientific and patterned a happy dire.

     So there I am on Youtube looking for the single track "Louder -- I Can Take Your Pain Away".   The first channel I came across was called NC Trap, or Trap NC, or something like that.   I initially thought I made a mistake and was at some furriers site.  Then I listened to a few things and thought Wow there is some wildness happening in North Carolina!  It was only later I somehow realized that NC was not North Carolina but No Copyright.  Blimey.  Trap Nation is where a lot of HIGHSOCIETY Music can be found.

     As for the term Trap, which describes another sub-genre of EDM/BASS Hip Hop with Blax influence, I can bring something to the table on that.  Trap was a place to score drugs, usually the projects.  I never liked them because there was a lot of treated weed.  The weed wasn't treated by the brothers, why would they throw money at something that worked fine as it was?  No, it was treated by the people running the drug war.  Cops would recycle confiscated weed by putting it back on the streets with chemicals in it, a little something for your teeth or eyesight, something detrimental over a long period of time.  Deniable tax free fundraising, and well within the spirit of the Drug War.  Drugs As Weapons. There was a lot of this and it just became more prevalent as time went on.  

     Predation.  

     It wasn't called War for nothing.  

     The earliest tests of drugs as weapons were conducted secretly on Rock stars, it was all about availability, making the drugs available, and a lot of the stars succumbed, just killed themselves overdosing.  CIA was already beginning to take control of airports during that time, and a lot of early rock stars, an abnormal number, also died in plane crashes, back when Rock Stars could be major social powers, not all diluted like today.  Some real old guard pigs were scared silly of John Lennons growing power when he was shot.

     The insiders selling high power poppy and coca drugs to the earliest rock stars also became very wealthy, of course.  Two birds with one stone and all that.  When the government becomes a juggernaut, and not an administrator of the peoples needs, it always becomes an elite mob of insiders making war on the rest, pure and simple.  Trap indeed.  I worked for three retired Police Officers in the early 1990s who retired early because they witnessed what happened at the housing projects in Fort Lauderdale during the 80s.  They said, and I quote: "That wasn't American."  

     Real traps were constructed by blocking off car traffic so that only a couple streets operated in and out of the projects.  Large concrete barricades were used.  Sometimes the police would bust 5000 people on a weekend in Dade/Broward, using drugs they themselves put on the streets, and almost all of the busted served mandatory minimums.  This is a matter of historical record, but not something you would see on mono-media TV.  The people running the prisons got rich as hell.  Trappers.   These are the movers and fixers in our society today, and their kids.  

     This economic trapping entailed flooding the projects with cocaine and weapons.  Secret insiders sold both the cocaine and the guns, making big money from genocide, along with all the lawyers.  It was called The Self Cleaning Oven (Playboy interview with Surgeon General Elders)(2).  The death rate was never well publicized but exceeded 40% in many places. The survivors got paid and all but a few forgot everything.  The equivalent of flooding the Rez with hard booze.  Very old tactix actually.

     Just a little of Americas Secret History for ya', from somebody who was there, paying attention.  This is all very hard-to-find information, kept from you by the very people who are paid to inform you!    I was working at Fed-ex at that time, 1984-87, #54169, out of the McNab Station near Pompano Beach.  People tried to sell me crack when I was in my Fedex van, isyn!  It was a Frenzy, the whole place was doing a slow burn, inside and out.  And it didn't just happen.  It was a program.  These Traps were intentionally set.  The media did as it was told by the political police, and everybody got rich except the prey, the people in the trap.  The higher you were in authority, the richer you got.  A lot like Covid. And 911.  And la la la, and on and on.

    We have all been handled.  The whole world.

    For the record I left Fedex because they were nazis about weed, which is all I use, and pretty much all I ever used, once I got off alcohol in 1991.  I could have lied my way through Fedex, but I didn't want to.  Call me weak for indulging such a thing as conscience.  All the American corporations are corpse-orations, want you to be a good hive member, lie for them, buy in.

    Ah, memories, and the evolution of language.   It is nice to see I am not the only one who remembers this stuff, even if we are just talking about vestigial awareness here.  Funny that I had never heard the word Trap used to describe a type of music before, but I am very familiar with its origin.  

     I kept exploring this new music I had discovered by actively seeking it.  Like a flower opening its petals to the sun my awareness was led inward, outward, and onward, to always newer places.  I was beginning to enjoy this adventure, these learnings, so I wrote to HIGHSOCIETY and received a very nice letter of reply.  I met James Guttman over the internet, and he was kind enough to answer my lists of questions, no matter how mundane, ill informed, or redundant they were.  I found him to be patient, and well spoken, and generous above all.  Here are some candid answers to my questions direct from the Artist himself.


                        *********************************************


    Hi James, thanks for your time.  Where do you originate, where is home?

    I'm originally from San Francisco. I lived in Amsterdam for the past 2 years and just moved down to San Diego, CA this week.

    How old are you, and are there any significant others?

    31, and Yes! I have been :) married for almost 4 years.

    Who do you admire most within music?

    I admire people who are truly being themselves and building something unique. Porter Robinson, Jeremy Olander, Rezz, Le Castle Vania, Kingdom of Giants are some names that come to mind.

    Who influences you most musically?

    Lately I have been influenced most by things outside of my genre.  Lots of rock/metal and more spacey/vibey house music. I actually don't listen to music that much when I am not producing it. When I'm not writing music I generally lean toward styles that are more "background" friendly.

    Please tell us about your collaborators.

    I don't typically do a lot of collaborations, but a few people I have worked with a lot are two vocalists, Matty McDonald and Sunnie Williams, who are both really awesome. When working with a vocalist it's typically all done online, via passing files back and forth. I have actually never met Sunnie in real life...  

    How about your preferences in collaboration, recent, past, future.

    I am working on another new song with Matty McDonald right now actually. Some acts I would love to work with are Purge & Pedestrian Tactics from the EDM world - from outside of EDM I would love to work with more metal bands. I really enjoy mixing genres and I'm a huge fan of metal music.  

    One article I read compared you to acts as big as Sonny James Moore/Skrillex, how do you feel about this?

    Well Skrillex was definitely one of the first acts that I got really into as far as "bass music" goes (I think this is true for a lot of people, in terms of his music being an entry point into the genre). I don't listen to him as much anymore but when I was first starting out I drew a lot of inspiration from him, especially the way he mixed melodic vs. heavy parts in the same track, that was pretty unique at the time. I definitely respect him a lot, he is always pushing genres forward and doing really creative things with OWSLA. So that's a nice comparison!

    Did you move to San Diego because of work?

    San Francisco is really competitive. It's a small music scene. I am actually no longer based in San Francisco, so most of my shows are going through my booking agency Cyber Groove.  It just depends who wants to book me. I needed to move back to the USA due to an opportunity with a booking agency that brought me on (http://cybergrooveam.com/) that will lead to a lot of US-based shows, so I needed to be based here.   Our visas in Amsterdam were 2 Year, and they were expiring, so it was a good opportunity to make a change. I haven't played in LA in a really long time but I have played huge shows there as well as empty shows.  It can be really hit or miss. I have only lived here for 2 weeks so...overall I think southern California is a bit more slow paced than San Francisco or Amsterdam, it's much more sprawling.  I have been really enjoying it. The weather is incredible... really goes a long way as far as keeping a positive mood.

     How about your audience?

     In terms of audience it's roughly 18-30 year olds, mostly men. A lot of your standard club kids but a lot of gamers and fitness people as well. If you look around online you can find tons of people making videos of themselves playing video games to my music.

     What happened in Amsterdam?

     We moved there for a work opportunity that my wife had. I did get involved with the music scene over there which was cool, but about 60% of the time I lived there, the music industry was inactive due to COVID. So I just produced/wrote a lot of music and focused on pushing my online listener numbers.
    
    Any hobbys or sports you like a lot?

    I'm really into health and fitness, I like to work out and do things outside.  I also love cooking and beer/wine so I'm always trying new stuff.

     Who does the graphic art on your musix?

     I do all of my own design these days.

     How do you feel about the competition in the Music Scene today?

     It's a bit of a double-edged sword for me. Overall I think this is a great time for music and art. You can teach yourself to produce music (as I did) on the internet entirely for free, self-release your music, and build an audience of millions. There is literally no barrier to entry anymore. The flip side of it is that there is a ton of really generic mediocre music that makes a lot of "noise" but doesn't really provide any value to listeners. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the amount of music out there.  Listener attention spans are also decreasing rapidly, a song/album release doesn't have the impact it used to. I don't really fight this though, I think massive cultural/consumption shifts like this are inevitable and resisting them is a waste of energy.

     Do you teach music as an occupation?

     I have guest lectured a few times about the music industry but otherwise no.

     Are you working on any Movie Soundtrax? Video Games?

     I have not ever done any original composing for any movies/tv/games but I have had a few tracks synced for TV on channels like HBO, MTV, etc.

      DJ'ing and performing seem to be a larger part of your work right now, true?

     Well not for the last 2 years, but it's looking like I will be doing quite a few shows throughout this year and into 2022, thanks to my new booking agency I mentioned above. I really miss playing shows!

     Is it possible to make a living with your music today?  

      It's definitely possible. My view is that you have to embrace the idea of running your own business now more than ever. Artists these days have to be amazing digital marketers, social networkers, content creators, etc. simultaneously. There is less money, being spread around more widely. So it's very important to create multiple revenue streams if you want to make any money.  Full disclosure: I do not make a great living from my music. If I lived off music alone it would be comparable to working a minimum wage job or something. I do audio/video editing as a freelancer on the side to make extra cash.

     Have you ever been part of a band?

     I have been in many bands, yes. Mostly metal/metalcore, but also some punk/pop-punk. I actually started in music playing drums at age 8. I was in a bunch of very serious bands from about 16 - 21 before I got into electronic music. Went on tour around the US a few times. Sometimes I miss playing in a band, especially playing drums. Such a fun instrument!
 
James Guttman / HIGHSOCIETY


                                    ********************************


 
     During the weeks of writing back and forth with James I spent as much time as I could listening to his music.  I heard a good bit of his earlier material, noting similarities with todays work, as you would expect, but I could tell it was the earlier material, also not unexpected.  Progression Happens, if you work at it, and James works hard.

     I also noted that the marriage of hard core sounds with melody that I alluded to earlier was not just something that occurred in the song Louder, it was something permeating all the Music of HIGHSOCIETY, even his remixes of other musicians work.  There is an underlying weave in the sounds created by James Guttman, high order, a percussive use of electronic sounds, spoken word, and singing vocals not usually employed so.  

     The listening appeal of HIGHSOCIETY is way up there, as evidenced by his listener/follower numbers, and the quality of his collaborators.  When I first took the song Louder off the Cyberpunk selection where I found it, I cut it at 3:25 because I was looking at the graphic, not listening to the song.  This is the version I listen to now, still, and to me it is an almost perfect FM version of the song, I mean it could really go off if given half a chance.  There are several others by HIGHSOCIETY in that category too, imho.

     There was nothing I didn't like, just some I liked more than others.  The cohesiveness of the music gets the part of my mind that goes grasping after order.  Sometimes these sound sculptures border the disorderly, but only just.  There is synergy, a sound that comes across as much more than the sum of its parts.  It is the freshest I have heard in a long time.  Genuinely Beautiful. Soaring. Intricate. Novel.  It truly is a new kind of music, in more than one way, somewhat due to computer tools and their manipulation of sound. The Infinite Palette.  There is high variety by HIGHSOCIETY.

     Another thing I especially like about HIGHSOCIETY are the many female vocals, my personal preference.  HIGHSOCIETY music is well suited, it seems, to the expressions of female vocalists, and these voices are utilized to the highest extent, in ways that make them musical instruments in their own right.   There is a lot of restructuring of vocals electronically to achieve all the effects one hears.  Some vocalists who collaborate with HIGHSOCIETY include Karra, Sunnie Williams, Matty McDonald, and Amy Kirkpatrick.

     My 4 favorite songs by James Guttman's HIGHSOCIETY are Fake featuring Amy Kirkpatrick, Sinking, Louder (I Can Take Your Pain Away) featuring Karra, and Heartbeat (Magic Free Release).  As far as what I personally like in music, this is as near perfect as I have come across yet.

     In my quest for new music many things occur, because its a multifaceted quest, not just about one or two things.  In many ways rage is my dynamo.  Everything is very intense and I wouldn't have it any other way.  If it all was to be put into one word it would be TRUTH, and there is enough truth to keep anyone busy for life.  Happenstance and tricks, best laid plans and accidents.  There is exaltation and depression and treasure and waste, even adventure.  Effort and reward all defined by the moment: action, reaction, random interaction...and order too.  Lots of order.  

    The world beheld by the majority is reflected in light, and also sound.

    To quest is to question.

    Music is news from poets.

fin

       .
-----------------------------------------

Bibliography

(1)Alex Constantine, The Covert War Against Rock: What You Don't Know About the Deaths of Jim Morrison, Tupac Shakur, Michael Hutchence, Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Phil Ochs, ... Tosh, John Lennon, and The Notorious B.I.G.
https://feralhouse.com/the-covert-war-against-rock/

(2) Playboy article with Jocelyn Elders, https://www.playboy.com/read/the-playboy-interview-with-joycelyn-elders

Rush, Roll The Bones

Various Online Sources

HIGHSOCIETY
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8P2v37hf-lZhnYqndWP7xA

karra
https://monstercat.fandom.com/wiki/Karra
https://iamkarra.com/

sunnie williams
https://www.sunniewilliamsmusic.com

amy kirkpatrick
https://www.cymbamusic.com/amybio

Matty McDonald

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_State

Trap Nation    https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCa10nxShhzNrCE1o2ZOPztg

https://highsocietymusic.bandcamp.com/

https://soundcloud.com/highsocietyofficial

N O W A V E

Music Review 

Cyberpunk


     I have been listening to music for a long time, though not all music is to my liking.  Some is forced upon me by other people, in situations where I cannot make it go away, or make myself go away. Like waiting for tires to be fixed, or at the dentists office before having some teeth drilled on.  La la ping ping tinkle tinkle, I guess the dentist is trying to show his level of culture or something.  Maybe it is music specially created to make most people relax. It sometimes makes me sick.  If the dentist knew how close I was to throwing up because of his music, he probably wouldn't say "Open wide and lets have a look."  

     During times of audio trial I feel like I am a captive audience, in every sense, and I don't like it.  Sometimes it even makes me angry, but what am I to do?  Nothing, thats what.  There is no recourse but whining and crying, and that is unbecoming.  So I sit and fume, and try to think happy thoughts.  I am not normally taciturn or grouchy, but crap music has been known to make me so.  

       I am not always hostile to other peoples music, either, and on occasion I have even heard good music from unexpected sources, which is nice.  Trouble with that is I have no control, I cannot get up and crank the devil out of the volume, so the walls shake and the windows rattle, or replay the song as often as I like.  Why, back before the internet there were sometimes years between the hearing of a song somewhere and finding out who did it.  That is because it was not usually a pressing matter, and because music as it is today was just being born.  Willy nilly serendipity reigned.  You might like a certain song that fit in a genre not played on the radio station you regularly listened to, so to hear it again somewhere when you were out was really something.  To hear it AND have the idiotic disc jockey say the artists name was usually too much to ask.  

     Did I just say idiotic disc jockey?  I did.  So sorry kids, Disc Jockeys in my day were not what they are today, no slight intended.  It was all totally barbaric, back in my early days.  You had to become a pest at the record store, or CALL THE RADIO STATION to get any info at all, like some little groupie, and that meant you had to sit and dial and dial and dial because of course you were lumped in with all the people trying to be caller number 37 for the 100 dollars free gas, or whatever.  The disc jockeys were many times aspiring musicians, now as close as they would ever get to stardom, so they acted like godlets and goddesses, which was perfectly ridiculous because the vast majority were fat and ugly from sitting on their behinds all their lives.  

     The whole mess was like riding in a covered wagon across Death Valley with your mother-in-law, a mother-in-law who spoke only in old TV commercials: its not NICE to fool mother nature...You're soaking in it now! And on and on.  Before the internet everyone was parched and starving, sick in mind body and soul because no one realized how to eat right.  We should thank Ja and our lucky stars every single day for the internet, and the will to use it.  Which brings me finally to the subject at hand, namely a music review of some sounds that grabbed me and might even be fitting revenge against the dentist and his artless tinklings.  It also says a lot for the artist because I am getting aged and jaded, and all the time hearing more and more music, and only the special stuff grabs me now.  Its not a lot.

     The last big thing in music I listened to on the radio was grunge rock.  That lasted a long time, but by then the internet was blasting off and me with it.  I never listened to another commercial again.  One of the first things I did was search for music I had purchased in the past, that was lost to me because of faulty media like vinyl, and 8-track, and cassette, and cd.  It took a long time for me to catch up, and I also looked into and listened to many bands I had been curious about, like "Box Of Frogs", old Yardbird Era British stuff, and "Hawkwind", which was so good it embarrassed America.  The penny boys took over then, and music became simply a numbers game of advertising dollars and privilege and computer generated statistics.  They were dead but they were grateful.  Those meatballs were way more interested in the technology to keep people from copying their product than producing anything redeeming.  They lost the yearning for redemption long ago.  They became shameless and tawdry and mean.

     After I caught up with things to my liking I began ranging out and it did not take me long to start catching sound waves.  Synthwave, Chillwave, New Retro Wave, and others.  There are a lot of compilations put out by the promoters of internet music and I listen to them almost exclusively now.  Every once in a while I will hear something that catches my ear and I go look up the Artist and their other stuff.  I have found so much good music this way I sometimes wonder if I am dead and have gone to heaven and don't realize it yet.

     So here I am listening along and all of a sudden, at the very beginning of one of the selections named Omen - A Darksynth Cyberpunk Mix for Aggressive Robots, there is something there.  It is different yet familiar, reminding me of some of the best Electro-Rock I have heard out of El Paso, not the new stuff.  There were musical distortions throughout the song which old guys like me have trouble adjusting to, but it does grow on you.  I think the distortions are called breaks and drops, but I am not too sure yet.  They may be somewhat the same,  distinguishable only by nuance, which is beyond me at this time.

     I've listened to a lot of Daniel Voicians and Daft Punk and Sonny James Moore (Skrillex).  I am familiar with their particular electronic distortions which seem to be very popular with the younger set, the kids who like to listen to music in cars with huge bass.  I imagine those Spaceship drivers really go for hard core distortions, in fact I know they do, because I have been there when they drive by and all the windows around me start vibrating.  Makes me jealous.  We sure didn't have that when I was young.   

     The distortions I am used to are kept in check (I think) by the marketers who realize how difficult some of the hard core window breaking transitions are for older or uninitiated listeners.  Thats because those distortions border on discordance, and in some cases wallow in it.  There is no wallowing when the promoter is trying to reach a larger audience though, and here is exactly where the boundary lines meet, this is the crux, the toughest nut to crack.  Is it going to be formulated music based on pleasing the crowd for increased revenues, or experimental music with the chance to be famous once you are dead?  Or maybe even something new, that no one has heard before?  That last one is just about impossible, but does happen.  What I was hearing from that very first song called "Destruction Man", was a radical contrast within the song itself.  Musical distortion came shining upon high order Rocktronics, and vice versa.  It was a borderline discordance in the sense of being different, not anti-melodic.  It really did grab me.  

     I went to the net, looked up the artist.

     N O  W A V E.  

     Well that's different too, I thought.  

     It was just the beginning.

     I listened to everything by N O  W A V E that I could find.  I was immediately hooked on "Obey", along with the first song I'd heard "Destruction Man".  The graphic on the singles was cool too, and later I found out the musician is the graphic artist as well.  I cranked those two songs loud and put them on cycle.  I was enjoying them immensely, and in the mean time I'd found what I consider the Artists best work: 

N O  W A V EXXXX Cyberpunk Mix

which is 45 minutes or so of killer music including Destruction Man and Obey, along with quite a few others.  I listened to that work a few times and got hooked on another song called Boundaries which is usually not the style of music I listen to.  I thought things like that were outside my line of interest, but this I like a lot.  It might be my favorite so far.  

     Sometimes a twist here, a twist there, suddenly things work.  I was intrigued.  I wondered if this was an entire band, because it sounded like it, or was it a single electronic Artist?  I doubted it was a single Artist, mostly because of the vocals and their true variety, but some could be samples and I am not well versed in what is happening in the realm of music making right now, except for the end products.  The world has moved on very fast, and I have had to take other turn offs.   I decided to contact the Artist and see if anyone would be interested in allowing me to review N O  W A V E music for my blog.  To my pleasant surprise I received a letter back complimenting me on my blog, and saying a review would be fine, send my questions, which I did.  Below is the email interview pretty much as it happened:

N O  W A V E:  Bill, thanks for your questions. Below are my answers to them.  

BG:  Where do you come from?

N O  W A V E:  I was born in Kyiv, Ukraine.

BG:  How old are you?

N O  W A V E:  I am 31, for good or ill.

BG:  Where did you learn music and how long ago?

N O  W A V E:  I became interested in music in my early teens. I tried my first musical instrument when I was 16, and that was a bass guitar.  After that I started writing songs and performed as a vocalist. I  taught myself how to play guitar with the help of books, then took private lessons of extreme vocal, trained breath, learned arpeggio, played drums, was DJing, tuned in the synths. I got a lot of knowledge from the practical experience shared by my colleagues, and from the internet as well.  It was never enough for me to play one instrument, so I became interested in musical sequencers.
 
BG:  Where do you live now?  

N O  W A V E:  I’m still living in Ukraine.

BG:  How do you employ your music in your life?

N O  W A V E:  The music is like a part of me. It’s something intrinsic and inseparable. It’s always with me. This is a form of communication: I can convey and receive information by means of my music.

BG:  Do you perform?  Raves?  Concerts?  DJ?

N O  W A V E:  Yes, I really love to give live concerts! Before the pandemic, I played my music as a DJ at the raves, cyber and underground parties, as well as at ski spots - it's exciting.  Now I am preparing for summer, I also plan to use my electric guitar and vocals in concerts.

BG:  Are you married or do you otherwise care to say anything about your personal life?

N O  W A V E:  No, I’m single. I could say that I’m in the constant search of beauty.

BG:  Any passions other than music you would like to mention.

N O  W A V E:  I’m a true fan of snowboarding. The other day I came back from the mountains, it's very groovy, especially riding the board to music! Also I enjoy martial arts.

BG:  What is your favorite music to listen to?

N O  W A V E:  Depending on the time and place, but mostly it is driving music like breakbeat, rapcore, metal, punkrock, techno, trance and what is now called cyberpunk.

BG:  What or who has had the greatest influence on your music (Not just one)?

N O  W A V E:  Without a doubt, this is The Prodigy, who have been with me from childhood, and up to this day! And also it’s Pink Floyd.

BG:  Are you 100% electronic/synth, or are there any other instruments?

N O  W A V E:  I also use an electric guitar and my voice in my music.

BG:  What are your goals?

N O  W A V E:  I want to live my life without a single boring moment, surrounded by good people and music. I want to explore the world, climb Everest. And leave something good to the world after death.

BG:  Have you gotten any radio play?  Is radio play a factor anymore or has it all gone internet?

N O  W A V E:  I don’t listen to the radio and, to tell you the truth, I don’t know what’s going on there, but I know that some online radio stations play my tracks. Mostly it’s online cyberpunk radio.

BG:  Do you have a promoter, agency, or agent, or are you self promoted?

N O  W A V E:  I release my tracks on the largest music label in Ukraine, but I do not have a promoter or agent and at the moment I do everything by myself.

BG:  Do you produce from a home studio?  What are your favorite music programs?

N O  W A V E:  Yes, I have my own music studio. I prefer to work in Ableton Live.

BG:  Who are you reading/listening to/watching now?  Who is your favorite painter?  favorite author?  Favorite actor?

N O  W A V E:  Now I am rereading Lao Tzu's DAO. I also listen to punk rock. And recently I watched the Predator films. Actually I'm a fan of the Matrix and Transformers.  I love Banksy's works, books by Jack London, Hermann Hesse, Stephen King. I really like films with Keanu Reeves, Christian Bale, Jim Carrey, Keira Knightley and Uma Thurman.

                                     **************
     
     Well I never.  To find an artist who will communicate is a rarity.  Even getting through is not possible a lot of the time.  To have an Artist communicate with interest, and in a manner so engaging, that is exceptional.  Thank you  NW !

     I tried to dissect my feelings over the music and was surprised when I realized that the songs I like especially, the ones that grabbed me, were the songs where there was anger evident, even sarcastic anger.  Thats how I feel about most things on most days.  In one of the songs (Boundaries) I think I heard the words videosphere and maya, and if that is so then I'm sure I am in agreement with the spirit of the anger as well as its manifestations.

    I am drawn to music that is angry in varying degrees.  Its either that, or the real Up stuff the Europeans call German Happy.  I do like angry the best though.  Its like 65/35.  In the song Discrete I heard a few things which reminded me of Jezebel by Noisuf-x, and in some of my favorites by NW I have heard other things reminiscent of Janes Addiction, and some Ministry songs.  "Deploy" vocals remind me of Sepultura.  Its like he is experimenting, putting things in his way, trying them on for size, and who knows where that will lead?  I am looking forward with great interest to the future doings of N O  W A V E.

     This music pushes me, it grabs me with new things, but also stays familiar, it makes me question and wonder.  And it makes me want to dance.  NW has an uncanny ability to insert vocals and alternating sounds into his compositions at just the right time, with a completeness I haven't heard before.  Everything fits, fits just fine.  As far as I can see its all dependent now on how far and in which direction the Artist wants it to go.  


To see more about N O  W A V E please visit:

NW Youtube Channel

 https://xxxx.nowave.com.ua/

 Apple Music 

Spotify

 

 

 

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